THERE’S ONE HAMLET IN CENTRAL PARK

AND

TWELVE OPHELIAS IN MCCARREN PARK POOL!

WOODSHED COLLECTIVE PRESENTS
TWELVE OPHELIAS
WRITTEN BY CARIDAD SVICH AND DIRECTED BY TEDDY BERGMAN
FEATURING NEW MUSIC PLAYED LIVE BY THE JONES STREET BOYS

PRESENTED FREE TO THE PUBLIC
IN WILLIAMSBURG’S MCCARREN PARK POOL

PRODUCTION TO OPEN JULY 24, PERFORMANCES START JULY 11TH.
Tickets are free but they may be reserved by visiting:
Get Tickets Here!

The Brooklyn-based theatre company, Woodshed Collective (woodshedcollective.com), will present the premiere of Caridad Svich’s Twelve Ophelias, directed by Teddy Bergman, as a free event at McCarren Park Pool, one of the city’s best-loved concert and performance venues, in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, beginning performances Friday, July 11, at 8pm and opening Thursday, July 24 at 8pm. The McCarren Park Pool is located on Lorimer Street at Bayard Street.

Twelve Ophelias centers on Hamlet’s Ophelia coming back to life, out of the water, to try to overcome her history and forge a new destiny for herself. She finds herself in an Appalachian Elsinore, Denmark by way of Deliverance—where Gertrude runs a brothel, Hamlet and Horatio slum it, and nothing is what it seems. In this squarely American and gritty interpretation of the Hamlet myth, Twelve Ophelias asks how it is possible to break old cycles and start afresh when the past so completely permeates your life.

The production follows on the heels of the Public Theater’s presentation of Hamlet in Central Park, creating an inter-borough dialogue—Hamlet’s in the Park, Ophelia’s in the Pool. Twelve Ophelias features a live and local rock/roots/bluegrass band, The Jones Street Boys (www.thejonesstreetboys.com), performing new original music, and showcases a host of talented young performers and designers.

CAST: Ben Beckley, Kate Benson, Pepper Binkley, Dan Cozzens, Jocelyn Kuritsky, Preston Martin, and Grace McLean.

CREW: Nicola Bullock (Choreography), Gabe Evansohn (Set), Emily Fishbaine (Musical Directors), Jessica Pabst (Costumes), Adam Rihacek (Fight Choreography), Jerad Schomer (Lights), and Ellen Shadburn (Stage Manager).

The production also highlights the McCarren Park Pool itself as a fascinating part of our urban landscape by placing the performers and audience amidst an Appalachian shanty-town installed inside the empty pool.

McCarren Park Pool was the eighth of eleven giant pools built by the Works Progress Administration to open during the summer of 1936. Mayor Fiorello La Guardia attended the dedication on July 31, 1936. With an original capacity for 6800 swimmers, the pool served as the summertime social hub for Greenpoint and Williamsburg. The building’s vast scale and dramatic arches, designed by Aymar Embury II, typify the generous and heroic spirit of New Deal architecture. The pool was closed in 1984 and in recent years has become a popular venue for live performances.
Visit WOODSHED COLLECTIVE at www.woodshedcollective.com for more info about our company.

Caridad Svich is a playwright-songwriter-translator and editor of Cuban-Spanish-Argentine-Croatian descent. She is the recipient of New Dramatists’ 2007 Whitfield Cook Prize for New Writing for her play Lucinda Caval, and the 2003 National Latino Playwriting Award for Magnificent Waste. She’s also received a Harvard University Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study Bunting fellowship, a TCG/Pew National Theatre Artist Grant, and has been short-listed twice for the PEN USA-West Award in Drama. In 2008: her free adaptation of Lope de Vega’s erotic comedy The Labyrinth of Desire premieres at Miracle Theatre/OR. In 2009: her adaptation of Allende’s The House of the Spirits premieres at Repertorio Espanol/NY and her new play Instructions for Breathing premieres at Passage Theatre/NJ. Other recent premieres include: The Tropic of X at artheater-Cologne (Germany), her play with alt-country songs Thrush at Salvage Vanguard Theatre/TX, and her US adaptation of the Serbian dark comedy Huddersfield as a TUTA production at Victory Gardens Theatre/IL, Iphigenia…a rave fable at 7 Stages/GA and Son of Semele/CA, translation of Garcia Lorca’s The House of Bernarda Alba at the Pearl Theatre/NY, and her multimedia collaboration The Booth Variations at 59 East 59th Street Theatre/NY and Edinburgh Fringe Festival/UK. She is alumna playwright of New Dramatists, contributing editor of TheatreForum, on the editorial board of Contemporary Theatre Review (Routledge/UK), affiliate artist of New Georges, and founder of the international theatre alliance and press NoPassport.

The Jones Street Boys make American music that is both contemporary and classic in its scope. Veterans of New York City’s roots music community, their debut album, Overcome, was released in October of 2007, which featured guest vocals from Jon Langford (Mekons/Waco Bros.) and received universally glowing reviews. They are currently recording a new album to be released in early 2009.

“There’s a punk glee inside the bluegrass craft–and a punk vehemence inside the bluegrass smile.” - Greil Marcus

“The Jones Street Boys, a country and bluegrass quintet from New York, play charming, unusually graceful acoustic music.” - The New York Times

www.thejonesstreetboys.com - www.myspace.com/thejonesstreetboys

Twelve Ophelias performs the following days at 8pm:

JULY: 11th, 12th, 16th, 18th, 19th, 23rd, 24th, 26th, 30th, and 31st.
AUGUST: 1st, 4th, 6th, 8th, 11th, 14th, 16th, 20th, 21st, and 22nd.

Performances take place at the McCarren Park Pool, Lorimer Street, at Bayard Street, in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Tickets are free and may be reserved at www.theatermania.com.

Directions to McCarren Park Pool

FROM THE BEDFORD AVENUE L TRAIN STATION:
Take the L train to the Bedford Avenue stop in Brooklyn. Walk north on Bedford to Lorimer Street, take a right on Lorimer, the Main Arch of the pool is on the left on Lorimer St. between Driggs & Bayard Ave.

FROM THE METROPOLITAN G TRAIN STATION AND THE LORIMER L TRAIN STATION:
Take the G or L train to Metropolitan Avenue or Lorimer, respectively. Walk out of the station and cross Metropolitan on Union. Walk up Union under BQE overpass until you reach Roebling. Make a right, walk one block to Lorimer.

FROM THE NASSAU AVENUE G TRAIN STATION:
Take the G to Nassau Avenue. Walk South two blocks to Lorimer Street and take a left on Lorimer Street. Walk 1 1/2 long blocks and McCarren Park Pool will be on your left.

DRIVING DIRECTION FROM MANHATTAN:
Take the Williamburg Bridge and get off at the very first exit, immediately upon crossing the bridge. Take a left onto Havemeyer Street. It dead ends into Metropolitan, where you take a right. Go under the BQE and take a left on Union. Drive several blocks and McCarren Park Pool will be on you right.

PRAISE FOR WOODSHED COLLECTIVE

NEVER THE SINNER

“Never the Sinner, just ended a crisp revival by the Woodshed Collective … director Gabriel Hainer Evansohn kept the action moving nicely … backed by a strong supporting cast and by Carl Faber’s excellent lighting, Teddy Bergman made a sympathetic Leopold.”
- Next Magazine

“Woodshed Collective’s version of the shocking story of killers Leopold and Loeb is enthralling…Never the Sinner is a powerful evening.”
- Duncan Pflaster, HX Magazine

“Woodshed Collective, in its production of John Logan’s Never the Sinner, transform(s) its audience into the jury that never was – from the stage plan, to the program, fashioned as a Chicago newspaper, (they) draw the audience into the fanatical fervor that surrounded the case.
- Backstage

“The Woodshed Collective’s revival of Never the Sinner reenacts the media frenzy the trial aroused … from every angle — even the production’s playbill is in a clever newspaper format. The four leads turn in first-rate performances. Bergman and Squibb actualize the complex relationship between Leopold and Loeb with terrific chemistry. … Never the Sinner successfully places its audience directly in the middle of this 1924 media circus.”
- Showbusiness Weekly

BLOOD WEDDING

“Woodshed Collective brilliantly executes this story of two families who become trapped in an unbreakable cycle off murder and revenge. Blood Wedding is a beautifully produced and…well acted evening of theater.”
-Show Business Weekly

Everything about Woodshed Collective’s new revival of Blood Wedding, Federico Garcia Lorca’s poetic tragedy, is striking…there’s eye catching imagery aplenty here. They know how to compose arresting, impressive stage pictures.”
–nytheatre.com

“There are many things to like in Woodshed’s production, not the least of which is Lillian Groag’s limpid new translation, which – especially in this ensemble’s naturalistic performance – lends a refreshing immediacy to Lorca’s prose.”
-Village Voice

“[Blood Wedding’s] climax is particularly breathtaking. The scene looks like a painting, and says more in a moment about the violence and hopelessness of the times…than pages of words.”
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This entry was posted on Sunday, June 15th, 2008 at 3:30 pm and is filed under Come see us play, Announcements, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.